Huh, huh...dumb-ass...
Posted on 03/01/2006 8:01:51 AM PST by cashion
NORMAN - A Norman police bomb expert said Tuesday he does not believe University of Oklahoma student Joel Henry Hinrichs III committed suicide by blowing himself up outside a packed football stadium.
"I believe he accidentally blew himself up," Sgt. George Mauldin said.
Mauldin said Hinrichs, 21, an engineering student, had two to three pounds of triacetone triperoxide, commonly known as TATP, in a backpack in his lap when it exploded Oct. 1.
When asked if he believed Hinrichs meant to enter the stadium with the explosives, Mauldin replied, "I don't believe he intended for an explosion to occur at that spot (on the park bench)."
"Some of us will forever wonder what he (Hinrichs) was doing at that time, at that place," Police Chief Phil Cotten said.
Hinrichs was sitting on a park bench 173 yards from the OU stadium during the second quarter of OU's night game against Kansas State when the TATP inside his backpack detonated.
"Someone saw him fiddling with it (the backpack) shortly before the explosion occurred. I think he got cocky, and it went off," Mauldin said.
Mauldin and Cotten briefed Norman City Council members about the explosion and their agency's investigation in a conference before Tuesday night's council meeting.
The FBI has said in the past its investigation did not uncover any links between the student and terrorist organizations. They have said they may never know whether the student wanted to get inside the stadium.
The student's father, Joel Hinrichs Jr., has said his son intended to kill only himself.
Mauldin, head of the Norman bomb unit, said investigators detonated at the scene the remains of Hinrichs' backpack, which contained wires, a battery and a circuit board.
Graphic photos of Hinrichs' headless body still upright on the park bench next to a tattered backpack were shown to the council.
Mauldin said investigators found "quite a bit more" explosive material inside Hinrichs' Parkview apartment on Sooner Drive, southeast of Lindsey Street and Stinson Drive.
A pint-size Tupperware container on a counter was filled with TATP Hinrichs had manufactured, Mauldin said.
A pill bottle packed with TATP with a fuse stuck in it was found behind a computer, he said.
The FBI reported in November that 0.4 pound of TATP was found inside Hinrichs' apartment. TATP is the most unstable explosive known and is "the explosive of choice" in the Middle East, Mauldin said. "It is so volatile, even a small amount on the tip of a finger will explode if it comes within 8 inches of a match," Mauldin said.
Investigators also found a quantity of acetone and hydrogen, components necessary for manufacturing TATP, inside the student's apartment.
"We found evidence of him compressing TATP, which is foolhardy, given its properties," Mauldin said.
Making TATP is a seven-step process, Mauldin said, with the substance becoming explosive after three steps.
Bomb squad officers used great care in removing the material from Hinrichs' apartment for fear it would explode, Mauldin said.
"And we wanted to get it out of there quickly. The longer TATP sits, the more likely (it is) to explode spontaneously," he said.
Officers also removed "a lot" of military rounds, many of them live, and pieces of metal from the student's apartment, Mauldin said.
Metal fragments often are added to explosives to make them more deadly, he said.
The explosives Hinrichs had outside the stadium were pure, with no fragmentation added, Mauldin said.
However, he said, the student kept careful notes of experimentation with explosives in the weeks leading up to the Oct. 1 blast.
Notes indicated Hinrichs experimented with adding fragmentation to explosives as if "he were trying to make a damaging product," Mauldin said.
Most of Hinrichs' experiments occurred at Red Rock Canyon, according to the notes.
"Someone saw him fiddling with it (the backpack) shortly before the explosion occurred."
He was probably putting in the battery.
Simply an issue of timing....
susie
FYI
Huh, huh...dumb-ass...
Are these available online?
His father still claims he was only trying to kill himself.
Lucky us, he succeeded.
Nothing about the Pakistani roommates...
DUMMO potential terrorist alert!
What a ridiculous cover up.
I don't know many folks who build complex explosives and head to packed football stadiums to merely kill themselves.
If his father believes that, he's an idiot.
Stupid enough to blow himself up!
Stupid enough to convert to Islam!
Makes sense... sort of.
Eeewwwww. Honestly, though, I run around packing explosives in my backpack every day. (sarcasm)
I wonder if the cop was winking at the reporter when he said this.
And they expect us to believe this?
I'm waiting for the diary.
All the lone nuts have "diaries," doncha know.
I don't believe this report for one solitary second.
Yeh, he probably intended it to go off inside the stadium. Either with it still on his person, or not. What about his "interesting" roomate. No way he didn't know about the explosives and weapons.
"Some of us will forever wonder what he (Hinrichs) was doing at that time, at that place," Police Chief Phil Cotten said.
If it wasn't a suicide, then he likely meant to set it off somewhere else. He certainly wasn't walking out to Red Rock Canyon at that time. (Night).
his father was doing talk shows within a couple of days of his death. Anyone who thinks he wasn't given a long talk by the feds and told to get out there is welcome to send me to other genuine suicides where the family goes on tv.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.